1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the problem of creating and distributing software for sensor networks. More specifically, the present invention relates to a method and an apparatus for synthesizing a scalable and incrementally updatable system software infrastructure for sensor networks.
2. Related Art
Wireless sensor networks are finding applications in a wide range of areas, including disaster recovery, homeland security, infrastructure monitoring, habitat monitoring, and pervasive computing environments. A wireless sensor network is typically comprised of a collection of devices embedded in a physical environment which gather information, perform local computations, and communicate with other devices and hosts through a wireless network.
Wireless sensor networks pose unique challenges for software developers compared to other forms of software construction because the devices that comprise wireless sensor networks have limited amounts of memory, processing capability, and battery power. As a result, wireless sensor network research has created designs for a wide variety of highly-efficient hardware platforms specialized to perform specific tasks. The wide variety of such platforms creates a considerable burden for the programmer, who needs to be aware of the idiosyncrasies of each specific platform.
Over time, as the installed base of sensor networks grows, the need to support applications across heterogeneous devices and platforms will continue to grow. The capabilities of the system software used during development of applications for wireless sensor networks can greatly affect the complexity of implementing wireless sensor networks. However, existing techniques for developing such applications have so far only focused on developing applications for a single platform.
Hence, what is needed is a method and an apparatus that facilitates creating applications for sensor networks without the limitations of the above-described techniques.